


as small as a world and as large as alone

by seraf



Series: fundamentally people [4]
Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types, New Dangan Ronpa V3: Everyone's New Semester of Killing
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Despair (Dangan Ronpa), Ambiguous Relationships, Character Study, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Implied/Referenced Incest, Introspection, M/M, Mental Breakdown, Mental Health Issues, Open to Interpretation, Self-Harm, Suicide Attempt, Team Bonding, Ultimate Talent Development Plan (Dangan Ronpa)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-06-02 13:15:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,006
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19442194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seraf/pseuds/seraf
Summary: it's hard, when half your class is two steps past okay.kaito momota tries to help his classmates - his friends? - and wonders if this impossible task is really one that can be rendered possible.





	as small as a world and as large as alone

it’s _hard,_ when half your class is two steps past okay.

kaito guesses he didn’t know how easy he had it. things might’ve been rough financially once or twice, but his grandparents were good people, and he always had friends at school. the one time he ever really got in trouble was when they found out he faked his id for the astronaut exam, and that turned out alright, didn’t it?

ryoma, every school break, doesn’t go home - he goes back to a prison cell. he might be the ultimate tennis player, but that doesn’t get him far in the eyes of the law, it would seem, especially since he hasn’t touched a racket since. kaito’s visited him there, as has most of the class. it’s the kind of place that sucks the life out of you, a mundane exhausting sort of grey through and through. everyone has hard, hard eyes, everyone shoves past you in the hallway and jeers under their breath and keeps their guard up.

‘ happy holidays, huh? ‘ he had asked, a little bitterly, when kaito had come - along with shuichi, kirumi, and kiyo, who seemed to be ryoma’s friends - to visit him over winter break, just to find out that he was in the hospital wing of the ward after getting stabbed in the thigh with a shiv by some ex-mafia meathead.

kaito is going to keep telling him to pick tennis back upand that his life _does_ have value until his lungs give out, but the words feel hard to summon here.

he remembers that story about how mob bosses would put peoples’ feet in concrete before dropping them into the water, to make sure they would drown and stay down. trying to be optimistic here . . . it feels something like that. like the struggle to maintain it is futile.

but at least _he_ gets to leave. at the end of the day, they all pack back up into kirumi’s car and drive out of the prison gates, and kaito can breathe again. there’s a guilt, in that pang of relief.

( miu jokes in the gym at one point that they should all take their clothes off and ryoma tugs his hat down over his eyes and mutters something about having flashbacks to prison, and everyone treats it like a darker sort of joke, but what if it isn’t? what can they even do about it? )

‘ you excited about your eighteenth coming up? ‘ kaito asks, excitedly - he was older by about two and a half months, and he can’t imagine _not_ being excited. they’re adults now. he finally might be able to go to space this year.

ryoma shrugs, apathetically. ‘ not really. ‘

‘ why not? ‘ kaito asks, blinking at him. he looks away in seeming disinterest, pulling the candy cigarette out of his mouth as his lips purse for a moment, considering a reply.

‘ not bein’ a minor anymore means they’re free to put the death penalty on the table, ‘ he states bluntly, and sticks it back in his mouth, back teeth snapping off the end. ‘ lotta the mafia’s already been pushing for it, too. won’t happen as long as i’m still at this school, but it’s fair game once we graduate. ‘

what do you say to that? how can you fix that?

miu is abrasive and too sexual and crude and obnoxious. miu is manic and hypersexual and always a hundred places at once, her mouth stalling to try and keep up with her brain. most of the class gives her a wide berth, and she’ll claim until the stars fade out that that’s the way she likes it, but kaito promised to himself that he’s going to make an effort with every person in his class, and that includes miu.

‘ why the obsession with doing things in your sleep? ‘ he asks, holding out the coffee she had asked him to bring her when he stopped by her lab, and she downs half the thing in one gulp, hands flying over bits and pieces. he’s also a scientist at heart, but the scope of miu’s inventions and the different mechanics and sciences they cover, does sometimes escape him. when it comes down to it, she _is_ smart. she just . . . doesn’t act it, sometimes.

( and he guesses he can understand that. how often does he get called an idiot, after all? )

she shrugs, scribbling notes into a sketchbook? that sits by the side of her hands. ‘ you waste too much fuckin’ time, being asleep. i don’t have time for that! i’ve got shit to invent. ‘

how many nights a week does she actually sleep? how many times has he been woken up at 2 am because of some noise in the night, just to find miu hunched over her tables and furiously at work? her brain moves too fast for her, sometimes.

and for awhile he thinks that might be it - maybe, for once, she just wants to get a good night of sleep without feeling like she’s wasting her time. without feeling like if she sleeps or eats, it’s cutting into the time she _should_ be working.

‘ why the hell do you keep coming by here? you gotta crush on me or something? ‘ she snaps at him, tugging her goggles up to her forehead to shoot a suspicious look at him, and he realizes she doesn’t actually mind his company. she’s just afraid it won’t last. afraid there’s some ulterior motive behind it.

he shrugs. ‘ i don’t gotta have a reason. ‘

she snorts at that, turns back to her work. ‘ so you are just a fuckin’ idiot after all. figures. ‘ he pretends not to notice the little slump of relief to her shoulders.

‘ my brother’s in a coma, ‘ she tells him, one day, in the same voice as though she’s remarking on the weather. she scratches her chest idly, looks away from him with cheeks turned just a little bit red. ‘ you . . . wanted to fuckin’ know why i keep trying to make things that work while you’re asleep, right? part of it’s so i don’t waste my fuckin’ precious time doin’ shit like sleeping or brushing my hair seperately, but there’s . . . that’s another part of it. maybe . . . if i can build shit like this _properly,_ it can help people, y’know? ‘

it’s . . . unexpectedly genuine of her. but the question still lingers.

what do you say to that? how can you fix that?

kiyo is _strange._ it’s an undeniable fact of having him as a classmate; he takes more joy in the dead than he does the living, he fades in and out of the room unexpectedly, his eyes always feel like they’re picking you apart. always curious, always watching. kaito finds himself checking the corners, the shadows, of every room he’s about to spend time in, with the half-paranoid thought that kiyo might suddenly manifest there.

sometimes he does, after all.

but kiyo has stories about the stars even he’s never heard before, and they get into a few interesting discussions about russian anthropology when kaito reveals that he’d had to learn the language and culture in training. kaito begins to pick up that kiyo isn’t always creepy, he’s just . . . enthusiastic, wrapped up in his work so much he can’t help but talk about it, forgets anything but.

but there’s something wrong with him.

he’s a good person, kaito thinks, deep down. he gives kaito more credit for being smart than many of their classmates, and kaito’s willing to give him that in return, but there’s something _wrong_ with him, in the times he talks to himself, in the two hours it takes him to get ready in the morning, in the way he keeps his entire body covered andholds himself as though for comfort, in the way he talks about pain like it’s beautiful.

‘ the rope was so taut i am led to believe that i was . . . genuinely asphyxiated a few times and then brought back from crossing the edge,‘he explains to kaito one night, the two of themsitting in the dorm’s lounge. he’s holding a can of soda inhis bandaged fingers, andthe mundanity is almost hilarious. ‘ the several broken ribs i sustained corroborates that theory. and . . . whilst i danced along that edge, they whipped me bloody. ‘ he cradles himself. ‘ i was able to meet again with the spirit of one i loved. any physical damage . . . i would have takenall of that and more for that end. it was the best gift they could have given me. ‘

asking him if he’s okay never works.

he just trails the conversation away, finds a hundred hundred glittering tangents; humanity is beautiful, yes, he says, for their astute will to live, to survive regardless of the circumstances, because of their fierce individuality, and kaito _looks_ at kiyo andbegins to understand; begins to see the way he defines every part of himself on his sister, begins to see the clear hints of someonewho doesn’t really want to be alive, andcan pick up on the message underneath; that humanity is beautifulfor all the things they have that kiyo does _not._

he wishes he could unlearn some of the things he knows about kiyo.

the moment when he left his history books inhis dorm room, so doubled back and headed in after dinner to grab them, and found kiyo staring at his bare arms, hands unwrapped and covered in blood, what little kaito could see of his face paper-white. he looked like he was lost in a trance. kaito almost carries him to the nurse’s office, but kiyo asks him not to, almost pleads it.

‘ why the hell not? ‘ he snaps, more harshly than he means to, gesturing widely, ‘youtried to _kill_ yourself, kiyo! ‘

‘ i . . . did not, ‘ kiyo murmurs, eyes sliding in andout of focus. ‘ i just wished . . . to come close. ‘ he tries to laugh, but that rasp to his voice is gone, and it just sounds empty. ‘ though . . . would anyone really consider it for the worst, if i had succeeded? ‘

‘ this is what i’m talking about. we’re getting you medical attention. ‘

‘ not . . . mikan. please. not the hospital. ‘ kiyo says, andhe just sounds _tired,_ but in a real sort of way. like he’s too exhausted to try andmaintain any sort of facade. and kaito barely hears it when kiyo says ‘ _too much like sister_ , ‘ but he hears it nonetheless.

it takes him andkirumi twenty minutes together to staunch the bleeding. kirumi doesn’t ask questions, she never does, but he can see the worry in her eyes.

‘ what was your sister like? ‘ he asks, weeks later, the first time he dares to pose the question.

kiyo tenses, shrugs, looks away. ‘ she was . . . the world as i knew it. i belonged to her. that is . . .as much as i can tell you. ‘

what do you say to that? how can you fix that?

shuichi is his best friend, probably. he’s smart, but doesn’t think so, and kaito worries sometimes that the help he tries to give shuichi, the blame or mistakes he tries to shoulder for him, might end up hurting him in the end. but shuichi is . . . willing to listen to him. from learning about his classmates, kaito is beginning to learn a little bit about himself. like maybe he talks too much. maybe he might have his own mask constructed. maybe he’s bad at confronting his own issues.

shuichi listens to him try and talk about all their issues and the tough work he has to do to try and help them. he can relate, spending time with the class and buying all of them - kaito included - presents.

he’s the only one kaito says this to.

‘ i dunno, shuichi, ‘ he says, the two of them lying on their backs after training, shuichi doing all he can to wipe the sweat off his face. ‘ there’s just . . . so much i don’t know if i’m gonna be able to help them with. like . . . what do you say to that? how can you fix that? ‘


End file.
